


Signed, Sealed, Delivered

by TheVoiceofWrath (meet_your_fate)



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural (TV) Fusion, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Crossroads Deals & Demons, Demon Stiles Stilinski, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Happy Ending, Hell imagery, Hellhounds, M/M, POV Alternating, POV Derek Hale, POV Stiles, Slow Burn, Suicidal Thoughts, Surprise Characters - Freeform, Temporary Minor Character Death, Torture
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-02
Updated: 2014-10-07
Packaged: 2018-02-07 03:14:15
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 20,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1882998
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/meet_your_fate/pseuds/TheVoiceofWrath
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Derek's soul isn't worth anything. <i>Can't</i> be, right? Not after everything. It's an easy decision for him, then, to offer it up in exchange for his sister's life.</p>
<p>If only the demon he makes the deal with weren't so intent on hanging around until Derek's contract is up...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Stipulare

**Author's Note:**

> I always said that, if I were ever going to write demon!Stiles, then it would have to actually be _Stiles_ who's the demon, not Stiles being possessed. So this is my attempt at that. I wrote [this AU idea](http://thevoiceofwrath.tumblr.com/post/90198429386/so-theres-a-gifset-ive-seen-going-around-before) on tumblr (beware of spoilers for this fic in that link) and it seemed to go over well, so I sat right down and outlined an entire fic. It's currently planned out for thirteen chapters plus a very, _very_ happy epilogue. I promise, it's so sweet you might get cavities!
> 
> But be forewarned that this fic deals with some kind of dark stuff. You know, people dying (temporarily) and souls being damned to hell and stuff. I'll try to keep the tags updated with everything that pops up and please feel free to point something out to me that you think I might've missed ♥
> 
> I'm playing fast and loose with demon mythology here to suit my needs, but I definitely based it on Supernatural.

She doesn’t smell right. She smells _ill_ and frail, like the sickly sweet wolfsbane that killed her and fever sweat. It’s been hours since she stopped sweating, though. It’s been hours since she stopped doing _anything_ —since she stopped _breathing_. She was already cold by the time he found her.

Laura…

The world doesn’t make any sense without her heart beating. It’s been a constant in his life. His _whole life_. To be so close to her right now, yet not be able to hear it… It’s like a bad dream. One of his worst fears—being absolutely, totally alone. Even when he was sure she hated him, her heartbeat was there, steady and strong and unstoppable.

Or so he’d thought.

He has no idea what to do now. He has no idea what she’d even _want_ him to do. He can’t put her into the ground with the rest of their family. He just—he _can’t_ because it’s his fault they’re there, too. If he’d been better, if he’d been smarter, if he’d been more careful, they’d all still be alive. The idea of adding her body there and covering it with dirt is more than he can handle right now. He just needs some time to come to terms with everything. Maybe some time to find a gun to blow his brains out, too, because what’s even the point of going on when he’s alone?

He should’ve been there with her. He should’ve had her back. Sure, she ordered him to stay behind, but that doesn’t make it any less true. They’re all each other had; it was his _job_ to have her back. It’s still his job. He doesn’t know how to do anything else, doesn’t have any other purpose…

So he drives. He knows these back roads, remembers them from before his life was ruined. Before it was ruined the first time, now. He can’t help but recall _before_ as he tries to clear his mind. Like maybe he’s dealing with this trauma by distracting himself with random snapshots of his life, of their lives together. Of moments they shared where nothing hurt.

Laura giving him half her cookie because he cried.

The two of them playing hide and seek with their younger siblings.

All of them gathering to listen to stories. Old family stories that Derek will never hear again, legends and fairytales and made up things…

The winter solstice is a time for celebration amongst moon worshiping pagans, to celebrate the longest night of the year and the inevitable return of the day, so a lot of the stories that were told on those nights were about death and rebirth. He’s not sure why he’s recalling them now, except perhaps that death is the common denominator.

Not that he’s willing to admit that she’s dead.

But there’s one story, one his aunt told, that he’s immediately reminded of as he crosses a crooked intersection in the dirt road.

In the story, a woman sold her soul to bring her lover back from death. She met a demon where two roads cross and made a deal; her immortal soul for her love’s life. The story ends up with the pair living happily ever after, of course, because you don’t tell little kids stories that don’t have happy endings. Not around Christmas, even if real life rarely ends happily.

But it’s the demon part that sticks out to him at the moment. Most myths and legends are based on some kernel of truth. If there’s a chance… Well, he owes it to her to try, doesn’t he?

She’s his sister. She’s his _Alpha_ ; he owes her everything. Even if he didn’t, he owes it to his family to try to save the last Hale.

He hasn’t really felt like he’s entitled to the name since he was a teenager.

He knows just where to go to learn how to summon a demon—the emissary Deaton owes the Hales, too.

♦

He comes back to the crossroads with a box in his hand and infuriatingly well meaning reminders that this might not work, that maybe Derek shouldn’t _want_ it to work because who knows what might happen when you’re dealing with a demon? _If_ she comes back, she might not be the same…

He doesn’t care; he _has_ to try. Deaton is almost certainly right. This is probably stupid, if not outright dangerous. But he’s going to take the chance anyway. He’d take any chance, do _anything_. He buries the box in the middle of the road and waits and _hopes_.

Derek smells it before he sees it. _It_ turns out to be a teenage boy with a grin and messy hair and a subtle sulfur smell, of things beyond mortal comprehension and of thunderstorms. Like ozone and danger. He’s immediately wary of the demon; he didn’t _really_ expect this to work, no matter how hard he hoped. No one ever told him demons were real until tonight, at Deaton’s. Though probably it’s ironic for a werewolf to question the existence of anything supernatural.

“Derek Hale. Nice to meet you, though I guess maybe the circumstances aren’t so great… I’m Stiles,” the demon— _Stiles_ —says. What kind of name is that for a demon?

He supposes it doesn’t really matter. They could’ve sent him a demon called Bob and he’d still go through with this. “My soul for my sister’s life. Laura. Can you do it?”

Stiles shoves his hands into the pockets of his unzipped hoodie, an ugly stripped thing, and huffs out a laugh. “Right to business, huh? You people never just wanna chat.”

“Can you do it or not?” Derek demands, scowling impatiently.

The grin falls from Stiles’s face. When he sighs, the sulfur smell gets just a little bit stronger. He wonders if a human nose would even be able to smell it at all.

“Theoretically. Maybe. It’s complicated; there are a lot of variables…”

Derek snarls, eyes flaring blue. It sets off an instinctual chain reaction in Stiles’s eyes, too, which glaze over completely with inky, inhuman black. It would be unsettling if Derek had the energy to give a damn about a demon’s eyes. “Are you not qualified? Are you an intern or something? You look like a goddamn _teenager_ , just bring me someone who can make this happen. _Now_.”

“Calm down, Jesus, I _can_ do it.”

“Then _do it_ ,” Derek snarls.

“We need to make a contract first. A proper deal. You have to agree to my terms,” Stiles says, frowning like Derek is ruining all his fun.

Derek sincerely does not care. “Fine. Alright. Give me your terms and let’s get this over with.”

“Well, we’re having kind of a problem with quotas lately, so I can’t offer you very good of an exchange rate.”

“Fine, whatever.”

Stiles nods, pursing his lips. His eyes return to a more human appearance, though the brown of his irises doesn’t look like it occurs often in nature. A bright, clear sort of brown that looks almost a pale gold in the moonlight. A demon trick probably. Everything about that face is undoubtedly a lie, right down to the ridiculous little moles.

Stiles nods decisively. “Okay. I can give you a month.”

“A month for what?” Derek asks, confused and irritated.

Stiles rolls his eyes dramatically. “Do you just have, like, no idea at all how this is done? Someone summons me. I fulfill their request. Admittedly, most people’s requests are a lot more simple than yours… But, in exchange, I claim your soul for hell. You get to live for X amount of time. It’s like a loan. When your contract is up, our hounds come to collect your payment.”

“A month,” Derek says. Well, okay. He hadn’t considered he’d have time; he thought he’d be dragged down to hell immediately. So, yeah. A month is more than fine. “Okay…”

Stiles looks at him oddly, like he expected Derek to _haggle_. Why in the world would Derek haggle? He’s already getting more than he asked for and this whole conversation is reminding him how tired, emotionally and physically, he is. It’s been a long day.

“Okay then. A month. And I’ll bring her back if I _can_ ,” Stiles says.

Derek glares. “What, no guarantee?”

“It’s hard work, dude. You literally have no _idea_ what it takes to locate a soul and bring it back to the mortal realm when they’re already in the process of being sorted,” Stiles says, as if that makes any goddamn sense.

“Sorted?”

“Heaven or Hell. You know, souls get _judged_. I have to catch her before she makes it into Heaven or else I won’t be able to reach her. So, you agree to the terms?”

Derek sighs. What does he care if he dies in a month either way? He doubts he’ll particularly feel like living regardless. “Yes.”

“Awesome. Let’s sign off on this,” Stiles says, stepping forward into Derek’s space and lunging at him.

Derek backs away and bares his suddenly sharp fangs in a snarl.

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Stiles says, putting his hands up to appear nonthreatening. “What the hell, man?”

“What are you doing?” Derek demands. His voice is thicker when he has to speak around his fangs, not to mention with the growling.

“Uh, wrapping up this deal? You gotta sign the contract, man, and we do that with a kiss.”

“That doesn’t even make any sense.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter if it makes sense; that's how it’s done. It’s how it’s been done since forever, since before writing was even invited. You see paper or pens around here?” Stiles asks, looking around as if he might actually find a magically appearing inkpot or something, the smug little prick.

Derek puts his fangs away and forcibly calms down. “And that’ll be it, right? You’ll fix it. You’ll bring her back.”

“ _If_ I can,” Stiles says. “So, come on. Pucker up, buttercup.”

Derek hauls Stiles in by his stupid hoodie and kisses him. The taste of Stiles’s lips, brief as the kiss may be, is distinctly nonhuman. He pushes Stiles away and glares, like Stiles isn’t moving fast enough.

“Go to her and wait,” Stiles says. Like Derek needed to be _told_ to return to his sister, to be there when she wakes up. When she _hopefully_ wakes up. Please, dear god, let her wake up...

Not that god has anything to do with this.

“For how long?”

Stiles shrugs and then he’s gone, disappeared to wherever demons go.

That hint of brimstone remains on his lips as he goes to his sister, to wait until it either takes or it doesn’t.

He wonders if he should feel different now that his soul is no longer his, if he should be scared that he’s going to die in a month and go to hell. But he’s not; he really just doesn’t have it in him to give a damn.

He probably would’ve gone to hell eventually anyway.


	2. Anastasis

Stiles has never, technically, done this before. The whole rescuing a soul from death thing; people ask for it surprisingly rarely. Mostly, when loved ones are involved, they ask for the sick to be healed. They don’t bother once someone has already passed on—‘dead’ does usually seem pretty final to people, after all.

He’s _been_ to the Between Place before, of course. Limbo. Most people in his line of work have been there. For Stiles, it’s as close as he can get to Heaven. No demons are allowed upstairs, right?

It’s a massive room. Sure, the mind interprets these things the way it wants to. Just because it looks like some kind of giant, ethereal DMV to Stiles doesn’t mean it looks that way to anyone else. But to Stiles, it has sconces that glow with strange light and marble floors and velvet ropes separating the lines.

The crowd of queued up souls is always a little depressing. Men and women and those in between, of all shapes and sizes and races and ages. So many people die every single day. Most of them will go to Heaven, though. It’s not like the standards are very high for getting in. Just be halfway decent, right? And don’t break any of the _major_ rules. Most of them will be fine—they just have to wait their turn in line and then they’re in Heaven.

Now, he’s never _seen_ Laura’s soul. He’s only seen impressions from Derek’s mind. He expects her to bear some resemblance to Derek, for her to have the same dark hair and unusual, multifaceted green eyes, for her soul to shine the same way. Like liquid moonlight in the shape of a person.

Whether that’s a werewolf thing or a Hale thing, Stiles doesn’t know. He hasn’t actually ever met a werewolf before tonight. There are surprisingly few werewolves interested in making deals with demons for some reason.

He pushes through the queue, apologizing not very convincingly when he jostles some souls about, and _there_ —Laura Hale.

And she’s right near the front, too, crap. He hurries to her and grabs her arm. Or, well, the arm of her metaphysical shape. It’s complicated. “Come with me if you want to live!”

Laura quirks a brow at him and overall doesn’t seem very impressed. “What?”

“I just—I always wanted to say that, okay? Come on. Let’s go,” Stiles says, tugging her along. She had to go and ruin what’s probably his only chance to pull a Terminator and that sucks a whole lot. She probably won’t even remember it, either. Damn it. Totally wasted opportunity.

“Go where? Who are you? I’m pretty sure I’m supposed to be going the other way.”

“Not when you’re getting an all expenses paid trip back to the land of the living,” Stiles says. “And I’ll be your pilot today.”

“What if I don’t want to go back?” Laura demands. Stiles is immediately worried that she’s going to put up a fuss about _wanting_ to pass on. Crap. Could this job get any more complicated?

He stops and looks at her. “If I were an angel, I’d leave you and let you go to Heaven and be all happily dead and stuff. But, honey, I ain’t no angel and I have a deal to fulfill. You Hales are just way, way too eager to be dead, you know that?”

Laura, suddenly, looks incredibly wary. “What the hell does that mean?”

“Ask him when you wake up,” Stiles says.

And then they’re gone, back into the world of the living. The trip shakes Laura’s already fragile being. Incorporeal spirits aren’t meant to be in any plane of existence where the laws of physics applies, after all. When he places her inside her cold, dead body, he knows it will take her soul time to come around.

He focuses on healing her from the poison that killed her. And also on the way Derek is sitting a silent vigil on the floor beside the nasty, bare mattress Laura’s body is lying on. Where the hell even are they? Some kind of burned out shell of a house. Oh, right; this is where the _rest_ of their family died.

Even Stiles thinks Derek is morbid for bringing his sister’s body here and Stiles is an _actual demon_ , who lives in _actual Hell_.

He continues his work unseen by Derek, since he doesn’t have to be seen if he doesn’t want to be. If he gently encourages Derek to sleep a little, too, well. He can’t be blamed; Derek looks like shit, he’s so exhausted.

When Stiles is done, he leaves the family to their reunion. Somehow, he expects it will be a loud one. And not loud with _hugs_ , either.


	3. Pulsatio

Derek wakes instantly at the first _badump_ he hears. He sits straight up and stares at Laura. Her skin, bathed in early morning sunlight through broken out windows, isn’t nearly as pale as it was before and her _heart_ is beating. He didn’t _actually_ think it would work, that he’d ever hear that sound again. He’d hoped, yeah. He’d hoped so _hard_. But he’s not used to getting what he wishes for.

_Badump_

_Badump-badump_

“Laura?” His voice is hoarse with sleep and emotion and disuse. He cradles her cheek in his shaking hand. She’s not cold anymore, though she’s not quite up to temperature, either. Wolves run hot. “Laura…?”

He watches the black lines in her skin, the sickness from the wolfsbane, recede back towards the wound in her shoulder. The wound itself is oozing a little, slowly working the poison out. It’s healing. Though she’ll probably be upset that her shirt is covered in blood and goo.

_Badump-badump-badump_

Her eyes open as she gasps in her first new breath, her irises glowing Alpha red. They focus on him. “Derek…?”

Derek nods and pets at her hair, smiling weakly. “Yeah, I’m here. I’m here, it’s okay.”

“Derek. What the _hell_ did you do?” she snarls.

Derek blinks. This… This was not the reaction he’d expected. But, whatever, let her be mad. It worked and he’s _happy_ and it can’t be undone. It’s final. “What I had to.”

“Derek Robert Hale, you tell me what you did and you tell me _right now_!” Laura demands, sitting up and shoving his hand away.

Derek grits his teeth; he hates it when she uses his full name like that. Bratty big sisters, right? “What I _had_ to do, okay? Don’t worry about it. It’s not a big deal.”

“I’ll worry about it if I want to, goddamn it! Now tell me!”

Derek sighs. “I sold my soul in exchange for your life. Okay? Happy now?”

Laura just looks at him for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she says eventually. “But I must’ve misheard you because I could swear you just said you sold your soul. You wouldn’t do anything so stupid, right? So, yeah, I must’ve misheard. Right?”

Derek doesn’t dare respond.

Laura stands up and paces around the shattered, ruined room. She minds the broken floorboards. “That isn’t even possible. No one can _actually_ sell their soul to the devil.”

“Not the _devil_. It was a demon named Stiles. Deaton told me how to summon him at the crossroads,” Derek explains.

Laura sends a withering look his way; she’ll be having words with Deaton, he thinks. “This is the stupidest thing you’ve ever done. _Ever_. So what does this mean? You’re going to hell when you die? That’s so _stupid_! I was almost there. I was almost in heaven, okay? With mom and dad and everyone. I was _almost there_ and you could’ve joined us someday!”

Derek doesn’t want to argue, doesn’t want to tell her that, no, he probably wouldn’t have been joining them. “I couldn’t, okay? I couldn’t let you die. I didn’t wanna be alone. So, sorry, but I did it. It’s done. I’d rather not waste my last month arguing about this.”

Laura stops pacing and looks at him. “Your ‘last month’? The hell does _that_ mean?”

“I get a month. Before they come to collect,” Derek says. He knows better than to lie to her, especially when she’s in this kind of a mood.

“To collect your _soul_? You have a month. Until you _die_. Derek, you did this so you wouldn’t be alone, but you’re gonna leave _me_ alone. You’re gonna _leave me_.”

“You’ll be fine,” Derek says, casting his guilty gaze down at the dirty floor. He’s selfish. He knows that, knows he’s needy. But it’s okay. Laura will move on and she’ll find a way to be happy someday. She’s not broken the way Derek is. “You’re stronger than me; you’ll be fine.”

She laughs, but it’s not even remotely amused sounding. It sounds like her heart is breaking. “Don’t you think I might get tired of always having to be the strong one?”

“You’re an Alpha. You’ll manage,” Derek says. He can’t back down from this. It’s over and done with and he stands by his decision. He wouldn’t change it for anything. He’d do it again in a _heartbeat_.

“How am I even still an Alpha? Shouldn’t it have passed to you?”

Derek shrugs one shoulder. “Maybe it takes time to transfer. Or maybe it could tell you weren’t gonna stay dead.”

Laura shakes her head. “I’m so mad at you right now.”

“That’s fine.”

“I need to go. I need to clear my head and find a shower. Don’t follow me.”

Derek won’t. He doesn’t care; she’s alive and that’s all that matters. Let her take all the time that she needs. Even if it’s more than the time Derek has left. He just watches her leave. She’s probably going to try to do something stupid. She’s almost _certainly_ going to go see Deaton, to see about doing something to fix this. But, as far as he’s concerned, there’s absolutely nothing that needs to be fixed.

He’s okay with it. He made his decision. Yeah, it was in kind of a panicked, desperate state, but he sticks by it nonetheless. Laura will live and carry on the Hale pack. After a while, she probably won’t even miss Derek.

It’s not like the world will stop turning without him.

It’s weird to think about being dead, though. He knows better than anyone that death can come at any time, when it’s least expected. But having a date set in stone… He’s not sure if it’s unsettling or liberating. He’s going to go with liberating. He takes out his phone and programs the date into the calendar. One month…

He wonders what hell will be like. Oh, he’s not second guessing himself. He still believes this is the best possible thing he could’ve done. But he imagines hell isn’t exactly a great vacationing spot. Will it hurt, whatever torment they have in store for him? Probably. He can handle it, though. There’s no amount of pain they can put him through that will make him wish he’d let his sister die.

“She didn’t take it very well, huh?”

Derek is startled into a partial shift. He’s crouching and snarling as he turns to face the intruder—Stiles. Of course. He shakes the shift off and sighs, standing up properly. “Not particularly, no.”

“That sucks. But, hey, I’m sure she’ll get over it,” Stiles says, shoving his hands in his hoodie pockets again.

“Yeah.”

Stiles looks awkward. Derek wonders if he checks in with people whose souls he’s going to take very often.

“Why are you here?” Derek asks.

Stiles shrugs. “Making sure the goods are in working order. Don’t worry, I wasn’t here during your reunion… Speaking of ‘here’, man. This place. I get it. I _totally_ get it. But you’re not really gonna spend your last month on this planet living _here_ are you? ‘Cause that would be messed up. You should at least have, you know, _bed sheets_ during your final days.”

Derek sighs and shakes his head. “Just shut up.”

“Rude,” Stiles mutters.

“Says the _demon_.”

“Says the demon who gave you your sister back. It was a close call, you know? She was almost out of my reach and she seemed reluctant to come back. I totally wasted the Terminator line on her.”

Terminator line? Yeah, somehow Derek isn’t really surprised. Stiles isn’t like any demon Derek would’ve pictured. He seems painfully young. Are demons born or made? Either way, it doesn’t seem like Stiles is some eldritch horror that was birthed at the dawn of time. He seems like a _dweeb_.

“Hey, what are you gonna do about the hunters who shot her?” Stiles asks.

Derek shrugs. “They’ll think they’ve killed her. No point in wasting time chasing them down.”

“Good to get your priorities in order,” Stiles says. “Don’t want your countdown to end while you have a bunch of regrets.”

Derek will _always_ have regrets. He deserves them; he doesn’t deserve to be carefree and happy. “What would _you_ know about regrets?”

When he looks over where Stiles had been standing, there’s no one there. Just the faint, lingering scent of sulfur.


	4. Segnis

Derek doesn’t have a lot of earthly possessions. None he’s terribly attached to anyway and even the car is Laura’s, not to mention all the family money. So it’s not that he has much to get in order.

But he thinks about things as he lurks there at the old house, waiting for Laura to come back. How he wants his body dealt with. Will there even be a body left _to_ deal with? He has no idea. He absolutely doesn’t want to be cremated. He thinks Laura knows that, will probably bury him the traditional way for their family.

It’s three whole days before Laura comes back.

“I’m absolutely not surprised that you stayed here this whole time,” she says. She looks good, looks healthy and alive. Her heart is beating and it sounds like a song to Derek, sounds like everything right in the world. There’s birds singing and there’s this, the steady percussion of her heartbeat. He sold his soul for that; he’s going to appreciate it every moment he can.

He just shrugs and tries not to look like he needs his big sister too much.

“I found us a loft. Let’s get out of here,” Laura says.

Derek goes with her. Of course, he doesn't even consider _not_ going wither her. She’s his Alpha and his sister and it’s in black and white print now that he’d do anything for her.

The loft Laura found them is nice. It’s up at the top of a tall, empty building and it has nice windows. At least Derek won’t have to spend his last moments looking at something ugly.

“So this is how it’s gonna go,” Laura says, sitting him down on some weird blue couch she must’ve brought up here. “I’m going to be spending my downtime trying to get your stupid ass out of the deal—”

“No. Laura, _no_. Even if you _could_ undo it, I don’t want you to.”

She holds up a hand to silence him. “No arguments. I’m going to be looking into it with Deaton’s help. But, otherwise, we’re going to enjoy what time… what time may or may not be left. Okay?”

“Okay,” Derek echoes, nodding. “Okay…”

Laura presses her face to Derek’s shoulder, which leads to them cuddling up there on the hideous sofa. It’s totally fine; Derek could use the comfort, too, and he hasn't been able to ask for hugs for years, even when he really needed them.

“Did I come at a bad time?” Stiles asks after a little while, appearing a few feet away.

It’s Laura who jumps up with a snarl full of fangs this time. Not that Stiles seems to pay it much mind.

“Oh, hey, you remember me?” Stiles asks with a grin.

Laura attacks him. She rips his throat right out with her claws and Derek thinks that, well, maybe she shouldn’t do that to the being who brought her back to life.

Stiles just shakes it off, though, and heals the damage. He coughs a few times and clears his throat. “Well, okay. I guess an argument could be made that I might’ve deserved that. But it’s not like _I_ did anything wrong here, lady.”

“ _You_ took my brother’s soul,” Laura growls. Stiles doesn’t seem terribly intimidated by her show of teeth. There are probably things more intimidating that werewolves in hell.

“Well, not yet, ‘cause he still has it,” Stiles reasons. “Obviously. And, also, he’s the one who _sold it_. It was a fair trade. I actually think he got a pretty great deal. Shouldn’t you be thanking me for bringing you back to life?”

“You’re just lucky I don’t know how to kill demons. _Yet_ ,” Laura says. She grabs her jacket and storms out the door. Derek isn’t surprised. She’ll be back later, once she’s sure Stiles is gone.

“Wow. She sure is a feisty one, isn’t she?” Stiles asks. He strolls over to the couch and plops down by Derek.

Derek would’ve thought demons would be a little more graceful than Stiles apparently is. But, then, he’s never really had much reason to think about demons as real beings before, so what does he know?

“I hope she doesn’t actually try to kill me. I mean, not only would she fail, but I’d probably have to defend myself. And it would probably void the contract if she succeeded anyway. Tell her not to do that unless she wants to go straight to Heaven, without collecting two hundred dollars… Why don’t you have a TV?”

Derek shrugs one shoulder. “We just moved in.”

“That explains the lack of… well, everything. Might not look too bad in here once you spruce things up a bit. All the brick is kinda nice and the big windows let in a lot of natural light,” Stiles muses.

Derek scowls a little. “I don’t really care. It’s not like I’ll be living here for very long.”

Stiles laughs. It looks like Stiles uses his whole body to laugh, his legs flailing out and his hands clapping. He has a huge grin on his face.

Derek doesn’t think this is what demons are supposed to look like. Aren’t they supposed to be terrifying? Or, if not that, then dark and mysterious and seductive? This particular demon isn’t going to seduce anyone with his gangly limbs and his childlike glee. Unless there's a different side to Stiles, one that can incite adults to commit sin instead of just kids to stay up late or eat too much candy or something. He wonders how Stiles got this job.

“I like you, man, cracking jokes about how much time you have left,” Stiles says when he calms down a little.

“It wasn’t a joke…”

Stiles sticks around for a little while. There’s no clock and Derek isn’t interested in looking at his phone, doesn’t want to know that Laura hasn’t texted him. Looking at his phone will make him seem as needy as he feels. But Stiles must hang around for at least a couple hours. He conjures up some Oreos from somewhere and offers some to Derek with enough insistence that he actually caves and eats one. He eats his in bites, while Stiles carefully twists every Oreo in half and licks out the filling before shoving the rest into his mouth whole. It’s fascinating to watch. He's not sure which is worse; the tongue Stiles has or the forked one Derek had been imagining.

The entire time, Stiles talks. He doesn’t pressure Derek to participate at all in the conversation, though he seems delighted every time Derek does offer some stilted comment or gruff grumble. Stiles, unsurprisingly, talks a lot about his work. Derek doesn’t really _want_ to hear about poor souls who have been dragged down to hell and have suffered eternal damnation all because they wanted something so much they offered their soul up for it. It seems _noble_ , that people would do that. People whose souls have worth, at least, not people like Derek…

But Stiles only tells him funny stories about people who aren’t noble at all, about people who sold their souls for Super Bowl tickets or for undeserved fame or for bigger dicks. One story is about a woman who thought she daydreamed her deal for winning the neighborhood’s Christmas decoration contest. She insisted, even after she was already in hell, that there had been some kind of mistake.

All in all, the evening isn’t terrible. Stiles leaves after a while and Laura comes back in the early morning, pale dawn light just beginning to filter in through the loft’s huge windows. She aggressively doesn’t mention Stiles, though Derek can see her nose wrinkling over the sulfur smell Stiles leaves behind.

She doesn’t say anything about it over the next few days, either, doesn’t mention when she can tell Stiles has been around. At least Stiles is careful not to show up when Laura is present. He says that, even though he healed the slashed throat easy, doesn’t mean it was painless. It’s better for everyone if he tries not to antagonize Laura too much. But Derek finds himself maybe, sort of enjoying Stiles’s visits. He never stays for long, says he’s only passing through, but the moments Stiles is there are somehow the moments Derek feels the _least_ like his life has a countdown clock. Laura is so determined to act like everything is alright that it just points out more glaringly that nothing really is. Oh, Derek is happy with the trade. He wouldn’t undo it for the world. But he’s still going to die and she knows it. They both know it and they’re not talking about it and it’s terrible. Laura is walking on eggshells, but she looks like she’ll be the one shattered and broken into tiny, jagged pieces at any moment. Derek feels sad that she’s upset…

But he’s accepted his fate and, really, she should, too. Nothing she’s working on with Deaton is likely to undo this deal with a favorable outcome and he just wishes she’d stop trying. It making everything harder. Enjoying what time they have left together, like she said she wanted to do, isn’t possible with Laura focusing so hard on getting them more time.

He only rests when she's near enough to hear, though, her heartbeat singing him to sleep.


	5. Aucupabundus

Derek’s soul looks the same as his sister’s, only it’s brighter and, somehow, a lighter shade of that liquid moonlight. Stiles could watch the way it ripples and moves for hours.

He has before from this very spot, outside the big window in Derek’s loft and concealed by a layer of dimension.

Derek is sitting up in bed reading The Divine Comedy in the original Italian, which would be funny and ironic if it weren’t sad, but he thinks Derek has always wanted to read it and is just trying to get it in before his time’s up. Good for him, trying to accomplish things instead of just moping around or something. He could spend his last days doing absolutely nothing. This is better than nothing, even if it isn’t much.

But that shiny soul lights up the whole dreary loft, which hasn’t been decorated at all. There’s only a TV because Laura brought it home one day. It’s never on when she’s not home. Stiles wonders how someone with such a luminescent soul can be so sad, can have such low self worth. No, of course he understands _why_ Derek doesn’t think too highly of himself. Stiles is a demon; he can see straight through Derek and into all of his fears and insecurities and secret, hidden desires. He knows that Derek blames himself for the death of his family. He’s considered telling Derek before that, no, the blame for that is on Kate Argent. She’s already Hellbound, whenever she kicks the bucket. Just like her father. Somehow, Stiles doesn’t think that would comfort Derek very much. There are some people who just always feel guilty for every little thing that happens around them. Derek was probably the kind of kid who apologized when they tripped and hurt themselves.

The point is, Derek doesn’t belong in Hell. Oh, sure, there are plenty of people in Hell who would’ve otherwise gone to Heaven. It’s part of the job, collecting souls, gathering numbers in this never ending game of which side has more power and influence. But those people, they succumbed to sin or were swayed into wrongdoing. Good old manipulation; they listened to the devil on their shoulder. Or the demon whispering in their ear, as it were. But Derek, no, he hasn’t done _anything_. Aside from the everyday type sins that don’t even count, Derek has been perfectly well behaved. He’d have gone to Heaven when he died, without a doubt. He’d have been able to be with his family…

Stiles feels the air displace beside him, wind buffeted by huge wings heralding Scott’s arrival on the ledge of the balcony. Stiles turns his head to see Scott crouched there, a pensive look on Scott’s face. With Scott’s golden-tan skin and the iridescent white of his magnificent wings, Scott looks every bit the perfect angel. The kind from some serious, artistic painting. Even in his jeans and t-shirt. When he smiles, there’s no doubt that he was meant to be an angel even when he was still alive and human on Earth. Some things are just meant to be like that. His soul is bright, too, almost blinding to a demon for those first few seconds now that he’s an angel. Not that Stiles knew him _before_ he was an angel, of course. He just knows that, whatever a human is in life, is amplified in death.

“Is this him?” Scott asks curiously.

Stiles nods and looks back to Derek. “Yep, that’s him. Derek Hale.”

“You never paid such close attention to one of your cases before,” Scott points out.

Stiles shrugs. “I check in on most of them now and then. Usually they have longer contracts, so I only need to check in every couple years.”

“But his is only a month and that month is going by fast.”

Nodding again, Stiles purses his lips. He can feel Scott trying to look into him, trying to find something inside so that he can more easily understand. Stiles hates that kind of scrutiny, but it’s okay if it’s Scott. Scott was the first real friend he made after he became a demon.

“You don’t think he deserves to be Damned,” Scott says eventually.

No, no Stiles doesn’t think Derek deserves to be Damned. But the contract is sealed and Stiles can’t do anything about it. He’s not sure he would even if he could. It’s all very complicated. He sighs. “There aren’t many people who will gladly give their life, their eternal soul, so that someone else can live…”

He ignores the pointed look Scott gives him.


	6. Oblatio

“Hey,” Stiles says as he comes over and sits down at the foot of Derek’s bed. It’s presumptuous, sitting on someone’s bed, but Derek doesn’t really care all that much. Stiles has been around enough that the demon smell doesn’t bother Derek beyond the initial distaste.

“Just passing through?” Derek asks. He only glances up from his book for a moment, though it’s enough to know Stiles doesn’t look as happy as he usually does. Derek wonders if Stiles has had a long day on the job or something.

“Yep. I met with a friend nearby, figured I’d stop in and see how boring you are,” Stiles says. He doesn’t have a heartbeat; Derek can never really tell if he’s being honest or not. Derek really doubts Stiles is ‘passing through’ as often as he claims, though.

“What’s hell like?” he asks.

Stiles doesn’t look terribly surprised by the question. “It both is and isn’t how one would expect, especially when they’re reading the kind of literature you are.”

Derek scowls. “That’s a vague and unhelpful answer.”

“Well, I don’t really wanna go into a lot of detail. It’s not a very nice place but, then, there are parts of it that aren’t so bad. Once you get used to it, anyway,” Stiles sighs.

“ _Stiles_.”

“What? God, _fine_. I don’t wanna freak you out, okay? Hell is _painful_. It’s _literal_ , _actual_ _Hell_. Do you think it’s all sunshine and unicorns? Because it’s not, obviously. It’s terrifying. But I think you have enough on your plate without worrying about suffering for all eternity,” Stiles says. His face is angry. Derek finds he doesn’t like that as well as when Stiles is happy and smiling. Still, Derek thinks he has a right to know what’s in store for him.

“I’m a big boy; I can handle myself,” Derek insists.

Stile laughs. Which, really, Derek wasn’t expecting that. Then he gets why Stiles is amused and rolls his eyes. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“It doesn’t matter how you meant it,” Stiles says, still snickering. “I bet you can _absolutely_ handle yourself alright, _big boy_.”

Derek huffs crankily and glares down at his book. His face is warm, though he refuses to admit he’s blushing.

Stiles, thankfully, relents and changes the subject. “Have you written your bucket list yet?”

Derek shrugs one shoulder. “Don’t see much point. There’s not a whole lot of time left anyway. I wouldn’t be able to do everything on it.”

“That’s ridiculous,” Stiles says. “Instead of crossing things off your bucket list, you’re not even going to bother writing one because ‘what’s the point’?”

Derek doesn’t see a problem with that.

Stiles is silent for a few moments before speaking again. “I was human once…”

Derek looks at Stiles uncertainly. “There’s something that can take a human’s soul and change it into a monster?”

“Gee, thanks,” Stiles chuckles. “You’re real swell, too. But, yeah. There is. It’s a process. It doesn’t take the same amount of time for everyone, but they break eventually and become _this_. It’s more horrible than you can even imagine. I… I broke pretty quickly. But still, it took a while. Time is different there. A week on Earth is years in Hell. And, in the lulls between the pain and agony and suffering, I had regrets. There were things I wish I’d done before the end. There were things I wished I’d made time for. Make a goddamn bucket list, Derek.”

Derek blinks at Stiles a few times before slowly nodding. He sets his book aside and fishes around in the nightstand for a notepad and a pen. When he finds them, he uses his knee as a table and starts writing a list. Stiles scoots up the bed so he can read it, too, occasionally offering suggestions. Some of them aren’t even half bad. It ends up bleeding over onto a second page, but that’s okay. Derek will probably add more things over the next few days.

Stiles takes the pages and sticks them to a fridge with some magnets from restaurants that deliver. He puts his hands on his hips and nods with satisfaction, before completely vanishing.

Derek has no idea where Stiles is off to. It’s strange. Stiles doesn’t usually leave with such little fanfare. Whatever. Derek grabs himself a beer out of the fridge.

He startles when he turns around and finds Stiles there behind him, grinning ear to ear and holding a delicious, familiar smelling pizza box. “What…?”

“Number seventeen on your list,” Stiles says with a wink. “One last meat lovers with extra,  _extra_ cheese from Big Tony’s.”

Stiles went all the way to New York to get Derek a pizza from his favorite hole in the wall pizzeria. It’s only fair, then, that they eat it together.


	7. Initium

Laura _hates_ seeing the list. Derek can hear her pause in front of it every time she goes near the fridge and can smell a whole new wave of sadness and desperate, futile anger. Derek gets it; he knows he wouldn’t be happy if their situation was reversed. But he’s going to take Stiles’s advice and actually try to, well, _live_ while he still can. He doesn’t want to be bogged down by regrets when it’s already too late.

So he starts trying to do things on the list. He actually leaves the loft. He goes to the movies with Laura, goes to the grocery store, goes wherever he feels like. To the library, too, and he finds out his account there is still active even after all these years.

He decides to try to recreate mom’s chocolate chip cookies. They were always the very _best_ and she kept her recipe secret, which always amused dad for some reason. He’s made ten different batches before he glances at the back of the Toll House chocolate chip bag and realizes—it was never a secret recipe; it was printed right here the whole time. It’s the same Toll House chocolate chip cookie recipe that basically everyone uses. He can’t even bring himself to feel betrayed or lied to. He just laughs, shaking from the force of it. Laura comes downstairs to see what’s going on and, when he tells her, she laughs, too.

Stiles helps eat some of the cookies they’ve accumulated when he comes by later.

♦

Laura comes up beside him as he’s crossing one of the newer items off his bucket list and sighs. “Okay,” she says.

Derek narrows his eyes at her. “Okay what?”

“ _Okay_ , I’m alright with this morbid list. It seems to be working out well for you. And I know Stiles is helping you cross things off it, which is good. But I still don’t like him,” Laura insists.

“You don’t have to like him,” Derek says with a subtle smile.

“Good, ‘cause I don’t. Now let’s do number seven; marathon the extended editions of Lord of the Rings one more time. I’ll make popcorn.”

It means a lot to Derek that Laura is becoming more accepting. He doesn’t think for a moment that she’s given up her hope of freeing him from the deal, but this is good enough for now.

♦

Her name is Michelle. Derek had been buying supplies from Lowe’s to build a dining table, number twenty-one on his list, when he saw her looking at tools like she was completely lost. He went over to help her because that’s what someone does when they’re trying to be alive and happy and stuff, right? And then she’d asked him out for dinner and he couldn’t think of any reason to say no except for the whole maybe he shouldn’t get attached to anyone right before he dies thing. So, here he is out to dinner with her. It’s the first date he’s been on in years, since Laura stopped trying to set him up with her coworkers. She has kind, hazel eyes and her hair is somewhere between brown and blond. She looks pretty in her sundress.

But this is the most boring date Derek has ever been on. And he hasn’t, actually, been on all that many dates before. She’s nice and they talk about random subjects, Derek carefully avoiding anything that might be too dark or troubling. Which is basically both his past and his future. But Derek finds himself hoping it will be over sooner rather than later and wondering if Stiles is planning on coming over tonight.

Sure enough, Stiles is there sitting on the kitchen counter when Derek gets home. “That was like watching the sweetest, most boring train wreck,” he says.”

Derek is entirely unsurprised that Stiles spied on his date. “She was nice.”

“Just what you need, huh? Someone ‘nice’,” Stiles chuckles, shaking his head. He hops down off the counter. “Come on, I brought video games.”

Derek hasn’t played video games since he was sixteen. But they sit there in front of the TV and play old Playstation games. These weren’t on Derek’s list, but they should’ve been. He’ll add them to the list later, after the fact, and cross them off because this totally counts.

It quickly becomes apparent that Stiles plays dirty. And, also, when he gets riled up? His eyes go black all over. Derek finds he isn’t really weirded out by that anymore. It's not all that different than Derek's eyes turning blue, is it? He has a great deal of fun trash talking back and forth with Stiles as they beat each other up on screen and forgets all about Michelle.

The next day, Stiles shows up with a Babe Ruth autographed baseball. Derek asks where it came from, but all Stiles will say is that he got it on the job. Derek doesn’t like the idea that it might’ve been part of the deal for somebody’s soul, but… it’s certainly a good start to a sports autograph collection.

Number eight on the bucket list.

When Laura sees it there, sitting on the shelf in its protective case, she says, “Holy crap. Is that…? Well. I still don’t like him very much, but this is pretty awesome.”

Yeah, Derek thinks. It is…


	8. Floruerunt

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Disclaimer: The most foreign country I've ever been to is Canada, okay? So none of my knowledge is firsthand. It comes from movies and google and a lot of it is complete BS. Please forgive any horrible inaccuracies!
> 
> Oh and if anyone is wondering, I'm not just randomly capitalizing 'hell' part of the time. Stiles says Hell with a capital H because it's a proper noun to him, a real, actual place, while it's just an abstract idea to Derek still. So he doesn't think of it as a proper noun. In case you were curious ♥

Crossing things off the list is becoming a habit and Derek is happy to do it. It’s nice, doing these things he’s always wanted to try but never got around to doing. Laura keeps helping and Stiles, too. He’s given up wondering why Stiles keeps coming around; he enjoys Stiles’s company too much to question it anymore. He wonders if that says something about him, that he prefers the company of a demon to the pretty brunette whose offer for a coffee date he politely declines or anyone else who might be interested in him. Why would he want to spend his last days making nice with strangers? He’s allowed to be selfish. That’s one of the things on his list, actually. Though Laura grumbles something about this whole deal of his being selfish when she sees it there.

Derek, wisely, chooses not to start an argument about it. If he’s allowed to be selfish, Laura’s allowed to be mad because he’s being selfish. He thinks the therapist Laura made him go see that one time a few years back would be proud of his growth.

But Stiles… Derek can’t let himself want Stiles. That would just be a terrible idea, right? Sure, Stiles is attractive—if Stiles’s face is even what he really looks like. Who knows? And, sure, they have a lot of similar tastes and they make each other laugh and they have _fun_ goofing around… But Derek is going to die and be dragged down to hell and he’s going to be tortured or whatever for a long, long time. He _might_ become a demon someday, but the odds that he’d be put into Stiles’s ‘division’ or whatever are astronomical. No way he’s the kind of guy they want talking people into giving up their souls, right? No, he’d probably go into more a more general line of demon work and maybe never see Stiles again…

Not that he’s planning that far ahead or anything, of course. And he’s worried that maybe Stiles _knows_ that Derek is sort of interested. Aren’t demons supposed to be able to see all the deep, dark things in a person’s soul? So, yeah, Stiles could theoretically know. Hopefully he doesn’t scare Stiles off before the very end, though. He doesn’t want to spend any of his last days, hours, _seconds_ wishing he’d done something different or said something else. _Regrets_ , right…?

“I don’t like this,” Laura says, arms crossed.

“Come _on_ , Laura. I’ll be back in a day. I’m not even taking any spare clothes,” Derek says as he checks to make sure he has his wallet and phone and everything he might need.

“He’s taking you to _Paris_ , Derek. That’s so _weird_. Who does that?” Laura asks.

Derek huffs. “People who see ‘go to Paris’ on my list and decide to, you know, make it happen? It’s not a _scheme_ or something. It’s _nice_ of him to take time out of his work schedule or whatever to take me on a trip somewhere I’ve always wanted to go.”

Laura rolls her eyes because that’s just what sisters do. “He _never works_. How does he even have a job still if he’s always hanging out with you?”

“Time is different in Hell,” Stiles says as he pops up near Derek, grinning crookedly. “I get lots of work done when I’m not here. Hey, Derek. You ready to go?”

“If Laura will calm down and say I can.”

Stiles’s eyebrows furrow incredulously. “What, you need permission?”

“She’s my Alpha,” Derek grumbles.

Laura sighs. “ _Fine_. Go to freaking Paris, see if I care. Bring me back something nice. But _you_ , you watch out for him or, I swear to god, nothing will stop me from ripping you to pieces,” she says, glaring and pointing at Stiles. This is the first time they’ve been in a room together since she clawed his throat out. Clearly, she still doesn't particularly care for Stiles.

Stiles raises his hands in submission. “Wow, okay. I promise I’ll bring him home in one piece. Jeez, you’d think someone whose soul I put back into their body with my own bare hands would, you know, like me a little more… Let’s go, big guy.”

Stiles reaches out to grab Derek’s wrist for the transportation or teleportation or whatever it is. Derek smiles subtly at Laura. “I’ll see you soon.”

“Remember to bring me back something nice!” he hears distantly as he’s taken from his living room to a small, crooked alley. Because of the time difference, it’s early morning here. It smells different than Beacon Hills. Not in a bad way, just different.

“Welcome to Paris,” Stiles says with a grand, sweeping gesture towards the street in front of them. “You want me to start singing that song from Anastasia with the Moulin Rouge dance sequence? I do a mean can-can.”

Derek rolls his eyes. “No thanks. I bet you sing like a dying seagull.”

“Rude,” Stiles mutters, but he’s grinning brightly. He nudges Derek with his elbow. “Come on. You’re such a nerd, I know exactly where we should go first.”

The ‘where’ in question ends up being a farmers market in a less touristy part of the city. Derek doesn’t even care if it makes him a nerd; he’s all too happy to peruse the market and get some things to eat, especially since it’s breakfast time here. He chats with the locals there in actual French, which makes Stiles smile at him… which makes Derek blush. But, whatever, he’s good with languages and he doesn’t get to use any of them very often.

“So,” Stiles asks a little while later, while they’re in a cab going down the Champs-Élysées. Because Derek had insisted they drive to the Arc de Triomphe and walk a while instead of just magically popping up near the Louvre. “Why Paris?”

Derek looks steadfastly out the window and ignores the way his face at the tips of his ears feel warm. He mumbles something about a rich cultural history.

But Stiles isn’t buying it apparently. “Nuh uh, the real reason. Come on.”

Derek glares at Stiles. “Because it’s pretty and romantic, okay? I’ve always liked the Paris scenes from stupid chick flicks. Happy?”

“Aww,” Stiles says, reaching over to pinch at Derek’s stubbled cheek. “You’re _adorable_.”

“Shut up,” Derek huffs. He bats Stiles’s hand away halfheartedly. In the review mirror, he can clearly see that the cabbie is amused with them. He’s pretty sure Stiles tips the driver extra well when they get out.

The sights are all exactly as beautiful as Derek always thought they’d be. Their leisurely stroll through the Jardin des Tulieries is really nice.

“I feel like I’m in a Dan Brown book. Robert Langdon could go by at any moment,” Stiles says, looking around as if he might see Tom Hanks with that terrible, terrible hair.

Derek rolls his eyes; it _was_ a nice stroll, at least. “You’ve read The Da Vinci Code?”

“What? I read,” Stiles insists as they approach the Louvre with its glass pyramid. Inside the museum, Derek spends a long time just looking at everything he can. He knows it doesn’t make sense to spend the _whole day_ here, not when he only has the one, so he tries not to linger on any piece for too long. Stiles is actually being fairly patient. If one doesn’t count his running commentary about the subjects in the artwork, of course. Derek just tries not to laugh at some of the inner monologues Stiles comes up with for the people in paintings or sculptures.

Stiles is a very funny demon. Not that Derek would ever admit it out loud.

After Derek finally agrees to leave the Louvre, they find a place to get some food to go and eat at the Champ de Mars, on the grass as they look up at the Eiffel Tower. Stiles steals Derek’s phone and forces him to look at the camera for a hideous selfie with their faces smushed together and the tower in the background. Derek totally doesn’t immediately set it as his phone’s wallpaper or anything like that…

If he were going to kiss Stiles, it would’ve been here. This is a storybook place for a kiss. It wouldn’t be their _first_ kiss, but Derek doesn’t really count the contract sealing one because he doesn’t remember it all that well. There were more important things going on in his life at the time than a quick kiss with a demon. But Derek’s not going to kiss Stiles. What kind of an asshole would he be if Stiles brought Derek here to a place he's always wanted to visit, only to ruin it by kissing Stiles when Stiles probably doesn’t want him to? Because, if Stiles wanted to, he’d know Derek wanted to and should totally make that first move himself. It’s only fair. So, no, Derek doesn’t kiss Stiles. But he thinks about it, about kissing Stiles right here in the most romantic city in the world…

Later, they make their way along the Seine and basically go into any store Derek shows an interest in. Derek makes sure to translate signs and stuff for Stiles so he doesn’t miss out on anything. Or maybe it’s so Derek can show off a little. Whatever. They end up a little off the beaten path and find a great little bookstore, where Derek happily buys some used books. He finds another shop with old jewelry in it and buys Laura a vintage necklace he thinks she’ll like. Stiles teases him about enjoying shopping and how he never would’ve guessed that what with the beard and the leather jacket and the jeans, which are 'clearly' too small, so Derek makes Stiles carry the bags with a smug grin on his face.

When they near Notre Dame, Stiles, instead of appreciating the cathedral’s beauty, starts making Hunchback jokes Derek thinks are in very poor taste. “Have you even read the book? The one by Victor Hugo, not an illustrated one for kids with the cartoon gargoyles on the cover.”

“Snob!” Stiles accuses, snickering and bumping his shoulder against Derek’s. “And, no, I haven’t. I googled how the actual book went once and I was so depressed. But I remember the Disney movie and I thought it had a really cool soundtrack. The villains always get the songs written in the best keys.”

Derek nods; that’s totally true. He wonders when Stiles grew up, since he can’t exactly picture a demon going to see a Disney movie.

“Where are we going?” Derek asks a little while later. They left the recognizable landmarks behind some time ago and the only reason he isn’t lost is because he has a good sense of direction. “This area isn’t in any of the guidebooks.”

“Oh my god, you’ve read guidebooks? You’re such a nerd.” Derek doesn’t think he’s just imagining the fondness in Stiles’s tone…

“Why wouldn’t I read guidebooks for a city I wanted to visit? It seems like a good idea to be informed,” he grumbles.

“Sure it is, big guy. But, no, we’re not going anywhere in your precious guidebooks,” Stiles says, stopping in front of a large building. It’s old. There’s no name on it, no signage of any kind except for a silver circle set above the doorway. Stiles nods towards the door. “Go on inside.”

Derek narrows his eyes suspiciously. “What, alone?”

Stiles grins wryly. “Them’s the rules, buddy. I know a guy who knows a guy, got the local high priestess to agree to let you in for a tour. No demons allowed, though. Go on now. I’ll be here when you come out, I promise.”

A werewolf temple. Derek has heard of various religious orders among their kind, has read about them, but he never thought he actually get to visit one of their temples. He never even thought to consider it; his pack was always more secular outside of the loosest forms of vague moon goddess worship… But Stiles went to the trouble of getting him invited inside, even though Stiles himself isn’t allowed. Derek is really, extremely grateful for the thought, let alone actually _getting_ this opportunity.

So he goes inside, brushing against Stiles on the way past and letting out a grateful little rumble. A werewolf gesture of thanks. Stiles claps a hand on his shoulder and Derek feels bad for leaving him behind—until the high priestess, a tall black woman with long, graying hair twists and high cheekbones introduces herself as Geneviève and begins the tour. Then Derek kind of forgets all about Stiles. He’d be a little ashamed of himself for that, but he’s too busy seeing the glass-ceilinged courtyard where night blossoming flowers and certain ceremonial strains of wolfsbane grow alongside other flora and where their religious rites take place. And he’s too busy seeing the library, where old tomes written by and about werewolves are kept. There’s one in a glass display case, open to a yellowed page that’s covered in characters Derek has only ever read about before and never properly seen; a written werewolf language, developed to keep their secrets from hunters and such.

Geneviève and one of her acolytes bless him at the end of his tour using water collected on a winter solstice full moon and wish him a safe journey. He thinks they might mean to the afterlife, not back home to California.

When Derek finally exits the building, the sun is setting and Stiles is sitting on the stoop, playing a game on his cell phone. Derek didn’t even know Stiles has a cell phone, but he’s glad Stiles kept himself busy. Stiles pops up and grins at him. “Fun tour?”

“It was really good,” he says, which doesn’t seem like thorough enough praise. It was way more than _good_. “Thank you. For bringing me here…”

Stiles shrugs one shoulder, grin going crooked as he winks. “It wasn’t a big deal. I know how to treat a fella.”

♦

“This view is amazing,” Derek says from the balcony of the hotel room Stiles insisted on getting them. He can see the Eiffel Tower all lit up, the moon near full in the sky.

Stiles snirks. “Better be; we own this hotel.”

Derek turns to look at Stiles, blinks at him. “Bullshit. What would hell even need a hotel for?”

“Hell’s in the collecting business; souls, hotels, whatever anyone can get their hands on. We own the moon, too,” Stiles says with a smile.

“You do not. No one can own the _moon_ ,” Derek insists.

“I’ve seen the paperwork myself, man. We totally own the moon.”

Derek just refuses to accept that. The moon isn’t for owning… “There’s paperwork?”

“Yep,” Stiles says as he flops down on the room’s huge bed. The down comforter fluffs up around him like a cloud and Derek wonders if that’s ironic, thinking a demon looks like they’re floating on a cloud like an angel. “There’s a whole legal department in Hell. Little scribe demons fill out contracts while we’re negotiating them and file the final product after it’s signed.”

“I didn’t sign anything,” Derek says as he goes over to sit on the bed, too, taking off his shoes at least because he wasn’t raised by actual wolves.

Stiles waves a dismissive hand. “The kiss was the signing.”

“How does that work?”

“Demon magic, duh.”

They eat room service. It must be a lot of incredibly expensive room service, too, but maybe Stiles gets a discount since this is a company hotel or whatever. They watch French TV. It’s a nice evening, the end of a nice day.

Derek has no idea how they get onto the subject of Stiles’s deal, though. They’re lying beside each other in bed, looking up at the ceiling, when Stiles says, “I was sixteen.”

“When what?”

“When I sold my soul.”

Derek glances over at Stiles, frowning. “Is that even legal?”

“They don’t really take into account whether you’re old enough to vote. Heaven and Hell have their own rules. So, yeah, it was legit. My dad, he was a sheriff, got shot and I was there in the hospital. I didn’t even know about demons or werewolves or any of it, but some demons in my line of work are like ambulance chasers. They hang around where desperate people are and offer them ridiculous things, ask what you’d give in return. And then a stupid kid like me, he says, _anything_. He’d give anything because the doctor says dad’s not gonna make it,” Stiles says. He sighs and shakes his head.

“I wouldn’t undo it. Of course I wouldn’t; dad got a couple more years before he had a heart attack and I’m sure he’s happy in Heaven with mom. But the crummy deal I got, it only gave me a day.”

Derek is outraged. “A _day_? Why would you only get a day? Why didn’t you demand more?”

“I didn’t know it was an option,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes. “Stupid kid, remember? And desperate, too. I’d already promised ‘anything’. Twenty-four hours exactly after dad’s miraculous recovery, I was toast. I looked it up in the newspaper afterwards and they blamed it on a drunk driver, said it was a hit and run. And not, you know, me driving right into a hellhound and totaling my Jeep. Not that I was trying to get away or anything! No, I was just trying to get somewhere where they’d never find the body. I didn’t want dad to have to see that, you know?”

Derek doesn’t know, not really. But he can guess. He’ll have to start thinking about where he wants his own end to come… “Was it painful?”

“Being torn up by hellhouds? Absolutely. And then the, you know, torture and stuff that follows. That’s not fun. Until it starts to _become_ fun and then you’re the one doing the torturing and your souls gets all gnarled and twisted until it’s not human anymore.” Stiles purses his lips and hesitates for a moment before saying, “That’s one of the things I’m ashamed of.”

“What is?”

“How quickly I adapted, how quickly I became a demon. Apparently I was a natural. They told me so, said I was meant to go end up in Hell, that I belonged there. That I was _born_ to be a demon…”

“That’s ridiculous. You were born to be _human_ ; why would you have had to sell your soul if it already belonged to hell? Besides, you’re not to blame for adapting quickly to a shitty situation. It’s a survival mechanism and it’s good that you have it,” Derek insists, scowling Stiles. “Being good at being a demon doesn’t make you a bad person.”

Stiles grins at him. “You’re totally one of those people who will go on and on about someone and how great they are, but refuses to listen when they try to do the same for you, aren’t you?”

“Shut up,” Derek says, looking away and totally not blushing. “I’m tired.”

He is, he’s been awake since morning yesterday in California, but mostly he just doesn’t want to talk anymore. Even though he’s very grateful that Stiles opened up to him and told him his story. He thinks Stiles is incredibly selfless, giving his life for his dad’s like that…

“Then go to sleep, chucklehead,” Stiles says, snickering at him.

“Do demons sleep?”

Stiles lifts a hand and waggles it in a so-so gesture. “Sometimes. Rarely, but we’re sinners, right? Sometimes we’re prone to sloth and we sleep. But not tonight probably.”

“What will you do all night then?” Derek asks.

Stiles winks at him. “Watch over you.”

Derek isn’t so sure that’s a joke…

In the morning, they eat real French croissants. Which Stiles orders—in French. Derek kicks Stiles right in the shin for that, for pretending like he didn’t know a word of French this whole damn time. Stiles is still laughing at him when they reappear in the loft moments later.


	9. Descensum

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't want to put a major character death warning on this fic because, well, Stiles isn't dead! He's a demon and he's, you know, alive and stuff. But this chapter does go into detail on his mortal death and his time in Hell as a tortured soul. If any of that is a problem for you, you could totally skip this chapter without missing anything _super_ important to the overall story. This is a flashback about Stiles becoming a demon, which I wanted to cover so Stiles's motivations for taking a special interest in Derek would make more sense.

**_January 17th, 2001_ **

The chair is uncomfortable. They always are in places like this, Stiles knows. They weren’t comfortable when his mom was sick, either. He wipes the tears off his face and looks at the floor, rather than watch the doctor walk away. Nothing else they can do, the doctor says. Is there anyone Stiles can call to come look after him for now…?

No, no there’s no one he can call. Who would there be? It’s been just him and dad for years. What’s he going to do now? He’s only sixteen—he doesn’t want to go into the _system_ , doesn’t even want to _think_ about being all alone now that… now that…

Dad is dying. Shit, dad is _dying_. All they can do is make sure he’s comfortable, the doctor said. Three gunshot wounds and they can’t fix it, they tried their best. Too much damage to the organs. Why does dad always have to be such a goddamn hero?!

No, wait, that’s anger. It’s one of the steps. He remembers from back when mom died, remembers looking at the pamphlets. But he can’t be going through all that now, not when dad hasn’t even died yet. He has to suck it up and be strong for dad. Dad doesn’t need to see Stiles being a mess during his last moments. No, Stiles can be a mess after it’s—after it’s done.

Someone sits down beside him, a man with a cane. “Bad news?”

“You could say that,” Stiles grumbles. He’d really rather be alone right now until they tell him he can go in to be with dad.

“Well. I’m sure he’ll end up in a better place.”

Stiles glares over at the guy. He looks blind, his eyes cloudy and unseeing. But that doesn’t excuse the dude for saying something absolutely terrible. He _hates_ that better place shit. It didn’t comfort him when mom died and it’s not comforting him now; it’s just making him angrier. “Listen buddy—“

“Deucalion. What would you do if I said I could make your problems go away? If I could ensure your father has a full recovery?”

Stiles blinks at ‘Deucalion’ and frowns. “I’d do anything. But there’s nothing—”

“You let me worry about that,” Deucalion says, smirking at Stiles. He can’t help but feel like Deucalion can see him, even without his sight. There’s something terribly wrong about this man and Stiles should know better than to listen to a single word he says. Stranger danger and all that. “I’ll make it happen. And you, you have to promise to take his place.”

“To… to _die_? I have to promise to die in his place?”

Deucalion nods. “You can have one last day, since I’m feeling generous. And then you’ll die. That shouldn’t be too terrible an arrangement, right? You said you’d do _anything_.”

Stiles thinks maybe he’s having some sort of weird grief dream, that he’s asleep in the terrible hospital chair… He nods. “I would. I’d do anything,” he repeats.

“Good. It’s a deal then,” Deucalion says.

And then he kisses Stiles right there in the hospital, which is the weirdest goddamn thing, but the way Deucalion’s eyes are a solid, shiny red when he leans back is even stranger. “Twenty-four hours. I’ll be seeing you again soon.”

Stiles has no idea what he’s gotten himself into here. But suddenly there are nurses and doctors shouting and Stiles stands up to better see what’s going on. When he turns back, Deucalion is gone.

But they’re saying dad’s vital signs are improving rapidly, that he’s going to make it, that it’s some kind of medical miracle. Well, Stiles thinks, that’s all that really matters here. That dad will be okay. He doesn’t care about anything else.

When they let him in to see dad, he hugs dad extra tight and tells him off for getting himself shot. He tells dad he loves him, too, over and over again. He doesn’t know what Deucalion did, but now he knows he’ll be leaving dad forever soon, so incredibly soon, _too soon_ , and he doesn’t want the last thing he ever says to his father to be anything less important than _I love you_.

Dad sends him home to get some sleep after a while, says Stiles looks like crap. Stiles tries not to laugh because, yeah, he bets he does. But he hugs dad again and goes. He doesn’t want to be here when—when the end comes. So he goes home. He considers writing a note, but decides not to. It would sound like a suicide note and that’s not what this is. He’d rather dad think it’s an accident anyway.

He gets restless as the time approaches, keeps looking at the clock and pacing. He doesn’t really start to freak out until he hears the howling. God, the howling is _awful_ and he knows whatever monsters they are, are here for him. It makes his hairs stand on end, makes his skin crawl. He’s afraid—of _course_ he is—but mostly he’s hoping these hounds don’t make a bloody mess of him. It would look like a crime scene, wouldn’t it? Oh god, he can’t have something that looks like a _crime scene_ be what’s here waiting for dad when the hospital finally releases him! So, Stiles maybe panics a little. He races out to his blue Jeep and begs it not to be finicky with him today. He needs her to get him far away from here, needs her to get him somewhere where dad won’t have to see the gore left behind because he _knows_ those hounds are going to rip him to pieces. Thankfully, the Jeep starts.

He doesn’t make it very far. He can’t _see_ the thing his Jeep runs into, but he can certainly feel it and he can hear it snarling after the dizziness passes from his head’s collision with the steering wheel. All the glass is shattered and his face stings from tiny cuts. The door gets ripped right off its hinges and thrown and the last thing Stiles knows is the feel off claws sinking into his flesh as he screams.

♦

Hell is—well, it’s _Hell_ , obviously. There’s less fire than he would’ve imagined, but the suffering and eternal torment are all accounted for. In this part of Hell, at least; he gets the impression that Hell is massive and has its own departments and zones and stuff. Right now, Stiles is in the part where they surgically remove your guts and then, like magic, do it all over again when the damage is healed immediately. Where they make you watch as your skin is slowly peeled off or break every single one of your bones one right after another. And he _knows_ that it isn’t real, that this is his _soul_ and not his body. But that doesn’t stop it from hurting. Just so much _pain_ , all the time.

He wouldn’t change it, even if he could. He’s still sure he did the right thing by giving up his life, his eternal soul, so his dad could live. That’s love, isn’t it? Suffering so the people you care about don’t have to?

In the moments between one session of agony and the next, he thinks about all the things he should’ve done. He should’ve told to deputies at the station to take care of dad, to keep him from getting hurt again, to encourage him to eat right. He should’ve made sure there were people looking out for dad. He should’ve made dad some food to last him a few days at least, while he mourns for his son, and he should’ve hugged dad just _one more time_. He should’ve gone to mom’s grave to ask for forgiveness. Why didn’t he do that? Sure, he didn’t know he was going to heading to _Hell_ , but he should’ve anyway because she’s in Heaven and he’s here and he’ll never see her again—

Kali, the demon who tortures him day in and day out, mocks him constantly. She says he’s a terrified little boy who would rather die than be left on his own, that he’s _weak_. That his dad must be glad to finally be rid of him. Stiles _is_ weak. He knows that. But he’ll never, _ever_ believe that his dad is _grateful_ he’s dead. No, dad is better than that…

Kali and Deucalion must be friends because she lets him come and watch sometimes. It’s the things _he_ says that really get to Stiles, things about his soul. He says that he knew Stiles belonged here before he even sat next to him that day, could see it in the deepest parts of his soul; that Stiles is dark and violent and evil and that will _always_ win out in the end. Stiles should just give in to it. Everything will be so much better when Stiles gives in to his impulses, to his _needs_.

It’s classic good cop, bad cop. Predictable. It’s a classic, but it's effective and it works on Stiles so easily. He _does_ belong here, doesn’t he? He’s always been angrier than the other kids, always been more willing to do what he has to do. He made his dad’s life a living hell. Who wants a hyperactive little punk for a son? Especially one who sucks at following even simple rules? No, it’s _good_ that Stiles is finally here where he belongs, where he can be himself. Where he can give in to those darker impulses. There’s no one to look at him strangely for pulling the legs off bugs here.

Kali lets him down off the rack and hands him a knife, says they broke him so quickly,  _easily_ , and that he’s a masterpiece. That he’s his true self now. After that, it’s only a matter of time before his eyes go black like his soul. It’s an easy, natural progression. He doesn’t even really notice that anything has changed until Deucalion comes for him and says it’s time to begin his training, that he picked Stiles especially for this job. Those brown doe eyes and that sweet mouth, his fake innocence, will net them a _fortune_ in souls…

And he _is_ good at it. He enjoys his job, likes to hear people’s stories and give them what they ask for. He really likes swindling the real jerks. So what, if he tries to be kind to the rare few people he encounters who are in desperate situations? It’s only because he’s been there, he knows what that’s like. But he never sees a soul like his in any of them, a soul that’s dark and predestined for a downwards ticket like Deucalion said Stiles’s was. It makes him sad to think of good people ending up in Hell. People like Derek Hale…

He only hopes that dad never has any idea what he’s done with his afterlife.


	10. Jucundum

Still achy from the full moon and all the running through the woods that goes along with it, Derek makes a huge late afternoon breakfast for himself and Laura. It’s a tradition and both of them are steadfastly not thinking about how this will be their last time. Their last morning after the full moon ever…

Derek fills Laura’s plate with pancakes and hands her the syrup. She pours a truly inadvisable amount of it on her food and then stuffs her face full of bacon.

“Graceful,” Derek says. She flips him off and he chuckles at her as he fixes his own plate, too.

“Your face is graceful,” Laura grumbles after she swallows. “I need more coffee. So much coffee. _All_ the coffee. Like, in the whole world.”

She pours herself more coffee and puts entirely too much sugar in it, just how she likes it. Once she’s more awake—though not by much if her huge yawn is anything to go by—she sighs.

“What?” Derek asks.

Laura rolls her eyes. “It’s nothing. It’s just, there’s a witch in town and I can’t find it. They’re good at covering their scent trail. It’s not a big deal. I’ll manage eventually. Hopefully before, you know, someone gets gutted for potions ingredients or something.”

“Nasty business,” Stiles says, popping up and having a seat beside Derek. “Witches, that is.”

Laura glares. “What? I thought demons and witches would be like peas in a pod.”

“Some, yeah. Some demons even used to _be_ witches. There’s kinda some overlap. But there are good witches, too, who don’t have anything to do with evil stuff. Don’t be so closed minded and judgmental,” Stiles says, grinning crookedly.

Rolling her eyes, Laura says, “Derek, make your demon go away. I don’t wanna ralph my breakfast all over the table because of his rotten egg smell.”

“Hey, that’s _brimstone_ , not _rotten eggs_ ,” Stiles insists. He looks genuinely offended. “I do _not_ smell like rotten eggs, oh my _god_.”

Derek shakes his head. He's not sure whether to be amused or exasperated. “Both of you, shut it. Stiles, you want some breakfast?”

“Nah,” Stiles says with a smile, immediately over his offense from a moment ago. “I’m cool. And I’ll take care of your witch, too.”

“What? What can you even do about a witch?” Laura asks, frowning like _she’s_ offended that Stiles wants to do anything in her territory. Like it’s her mess to take care of, even if she doesn’t want to. It’s the principle of the matter.

“These kinds of witches and demons are like this, right?” Stiles says, holding crossed fingers up. “It’ll be an easy fix. And I’ll even be able to find them, like, right away. It’ll be a piece of cake.”

Sure enough, they’re standing outside a suburban house not half an hour later.

“Really?” Derek asks. He glares at the rose bushes, deceptively normal, pretty rose bushes. “Evil witches live in the suburbs now?”

“Yeah! What happened to creepy lairs deep in the woods and stuff?” Laura asks. She looks disappointed. Derek sure isn’t; a confrontation in the deep, dark woods with an evil with doesn’t sound like his idea of a fun day.

Stiles shrugs. “Gotta adapt with the times.”

Laura huffs and strides for the front door. “Fine. This is as good a place as any for a decapitation to take place.”

“Whoa!” Stiles says, grabbing Laura by the arm and yanking her to a stop. “Are you for real? You have no idea what you could be walking into in there. You and Derek stay out here; I told you, I’ll take care of this.”

Laura doesn’t like being told what to do, Derek knows, and especially not in her own territory. But she watches Stiles go into the house alone. “He’s ballsy,” Laura says.

Derek doesn’t really think that’s a compliment, not right now. He nods, though, because it’s true.

They both listen in with their werewolf hearing, heads tilted slightly. They hear Stiles talking with the witch. Stiles doesn’t even have to convince the witch what he is; she knows on sight and is apparently pretty okay with him being in her house. They listen to Stiles explain the situation, that he has some non-human friends in the area here and they’re a territorial species. He’d appreciate it a whole lot if she’d move shop somewhere else. She seems hesitant, so Stiles offers her a deal; a power boost in exchange for her staying out of Beacon Hills forever. Hasn’t she always wanted to overthrow her coven leader…?

Stiles is good. Well, ‘good’ might be a bad choice of words in this context. He’s good at his _job_ , at least. Derek wonders why Stiles doesn’t ask for the witch’s soul until he realizes—she’s already going to hell anyway. Stiles doesn’t _need_ to barter for her soul.

Stiles comes back out a little while later with a smile on his face, the kind that speaks of a job well done. “She’ll be gone by tomorrow. As a bonus, that coven leader she wants to overthrow is a real A-hole, so I think everyone wins here. Except the A-hole probably… We good?”

“We’re good,” Laura says with a smile of her own. “You’re a real smooth talker sometimes, you know that?”

Stiles grins. “I _do_ know that, thank you for noticing.”

Derek frowns and looks between the pair of them. Are they… are they suddenly getting along? That’s _horrible_. It’s just what he needs; his sister and his… whatever Stiles is, being _friends_. Though also, maybe, Derek might be in kind of a bad mood because Stiles just made a deal with that witch.

Which means he _kissed_ her…

Laura makes them go to the store for groceries. She declares they’re having a movie night and Derek never buys the popcorn she likes. Even though that’s a lie; he buys it, then she eats it all and pretends he didn’t get any in the first place. It’s super irritating, but whatever. By the way she makes sure to include Stiles in the shopping, in the bossing people around to grab this or that and put it in the cart, Stiles is clearly also invited. Derek’s pretty sure he’s going to spend the evening sitting between them on the couch while they snark at the television. It’s going to be a long night.

But it’s also going to be one of his _last_ few nights so, yeah, it’s okay to spend it sitting on the couch with Laura and Stiles on either side of him…

On the way back to the loft, Stiles asks if he can invite a friend over. Derek can barely breathe for a moment, thinking that—oh _god_ —Stiles might have a girlfriend or boyfriend or _lover_ or whatever it is demons call their significant others. But then Stiles says his friend Scott has been wanting to meet them and swears up and down that Scott isn’t a demon, that they’ll like him because everybody likes Scott. Derek breathes easier because it doesn’t _sound_ like Scott is anything but Stiles’s friend. Laura gives Stiles permission to bring over this Scott guy, at any rate.

Scott makes a sudden appearance while they’re unpacking the groceries, a sunshiny smile on his face. He’s absolutely _not_ a demon. But he’s not human, either, is something else entirely…

“I’m Scott,” he says happily, bouncing on the balls of his feet.

“Get your wing outta my business, feather face,” Stiles snickers, batting at something only he can see. Scott laughs and, apparently, gets his wing _more_ in Stiles’s business. Stiles almost falls over from being jostled by it.

“Wing as in… angel?” Laura asks, eying Scott. “Really?”

Scott nods. “Yep. Is there anything I can help with?”

“We’re gonna make some popcorn…?” Laura says uncertainly.

“Awesome. I’m great at making popcorn. It’s, like, an art form,” Scott says as he grabs the box of popcorn and starts reading over the instructions.

Laura just kind of blinks a few times. “There’s an angel making popcorn in my kitchen. How has my life come to this?”

Stiles bumps his shoulder against Laura’s. “You get used to it after a while.”

Derek’s not so sure he wants Laura to get used to this. But, mostly, he’s trying not to feel _sad_. He doesn’t want to feel sad, not today, but to be faced with the exact opposite of what lies in his future? To see Scott, an angel, and know that’s a million miles away from what Derek will become someday? That makes him _sad_. But Scott and Stiles are friends. If they can make a friendship work, clearly being a demon doesn’t mean any drastic personality changes. Not that Derek is ever necessarily going to _become_ a demon… He wonders if Scott has seen Derek’s parents up in heaven. How does that even work? But, no, he doesn’t want to know; he wouldn’t be able to bear the answer, not knowing he’s got a one way ticket to hell.

“How did you two even meet?” Laura asks. “On the job? Oh my god, were you two the shoulder angel and devil pair for the same person?”

Scott snickers and shakes his head. “That’s not really how it works.”

“We met at a… a _mixer_ , I guess you could call it. Kind of like a party on neutral ground. We were both pretty new at our jobs and it was our first gathering like that, so we hung out together,” Stiles says. He’s grinning, remembering the party fondly. “We’ve been interspecies BFFs ever since.”

When they eventually make it over to the couch for movies, Derek ends up crammed in the middle with Stiles, Laura and Scott on the outsides. There is snark, just like he expected, and Scott’s a welcome addition to the fun. He’s a nice guy. It’s a good night, one he’ll remember when he’s in hell and longing for better times…


	11. Coeuntibus

Before he knows it, his time is up. Derek is going to die tomorrow. He’s kind of disassociated from the whole thing. Is he afraid? Absolutely. But he’s not going to fight it. He’s not going to waste time trying to run. No, he’s doing this of his own free will. He’s afraid of what comes _after_ , not the actual dying. Mostly, he’s worried about Laura. She’s so upset because her and Deaton couldn’t find any way to undo the deal. All they could find were ways to keep the hellhounds at bay, but running forever and hiding in protective circles is no way to live. She knows he doesn’t want that.

He’s sorry she’s upset… but there’s nothing he can do about it. He made his choice and he’s sticking to it, no matter what. There isn’t even anything he _could_ do if he wanted to.

He and Laura are just silently hanging around in the kitchen, the air about them so painfully somber. It feels like maybe Derek has already died or something. He’s glad when Stiles shows up; Stiles just being here lightens up the atmosphere, even if only a little.

“I’m gonna go for a run,” Laura says after a few awkward, terrible minutes. “Get my big girl pants on for tomorrow. I… I can’t be around you right now, Stiles.”

“I understand,” Stiles says without even a hint of sass or humor. Derek knows Stiles blames himself for this, even though Derek sees Stiles as the person who brought his sister back. Stiles doesn’t have any reason to feel guilty. He’s just doing his job…

Laura tries to discreetly wipe tears off her cheeks, sunken from a month of focusing on saving Derek instead of taking care of herself, as she heads for the door. Derek and Stiles watch her go, then Stiles sighs and puts a smile on.

Derek doesn’t like the way Stiles’s eyes are still sad, even with that smile on his face. It’s such a contradictory expression that it’s painful to look at, that it makes Derek’s heart ache. Sure, Derek is dying. But maybe, _maybe_ , he and Stiles will still get to be friends. If Stiles can be friends with an angel, surely he can be friends—or maybe something more—with Derek, no matter what happens when Derek gets to hell…?

“So, last night on Earth, huh? How do you wanna spend it?” Stiles asks.

Derek decides to just… _stop_. To stop questioning and hesitating. This _is_ his last night on Earth and, goddamn it, he’s going to do something worthwhile with it. He’s not thinking about any of the remaining few items on his list. No, he’s thinking about something he never dared to write down. He crowds in close to Stiles, pressing him back against the counter, and cradles Stiles’s face with both hands as he leans in to kiss Stiles squarely on the mouth. The mouth that he’s been looking at and wanting for too long. It’s somehow both tentative and desperate and it doesn’t last very long, just long enough to get his point across and to taste Stiles on his lips. He chases that taste with his tongue and touches his forehead to Stiles’s, staying intimately close. “Tell me this is okay. Tell me you want this, too…”

It’s a bad idea. It’s a _terrible_ idea, really, but this is the last night of his mortal life and he wants to make the most of it. He wants this once, even if he can never have it again.

Stiles groans and tugs Derek closer by the ass, sliding one hand right into Derek’s back pocket. “Derek Hale, I’ve been waiting for you to make a move _all month_. I just—I figured you didn’t want to, not with a demon. Especially not with the demon who took your soul away from you.”

“Shh,” Derek says, kissing Stiles again to just shut down that whole ridiculous train of thought. “I don’t _care_ about any of that. I just want you.”

Stiles kisses Derek this time, getting his other hand in Derek’s hair to tug at it as Derek pushes him into the counter and grinds against him. When Derek manages to redirect his mouth to Stiles’s neck, trying futilely to put a mark there, Stiles starts shoving at Derek’s clothes. Derek can hear the zipper on his jeans break and he can’t help but laugh a little at Stiles’s cussing over it. He leans back enough to pull his own shirt off and then Stiles’s, too, running his hands over pale, mole dotted skin. Stiles is _beautiful_.

“Less gazing longingly and more, you know, _doing it_ ,” Stiles says, rolling his eyes and using strength that must come from being a demon to push and steer Derek over for the bed. He never really liked having a bed in the middle of the loft until just this moment, as he’s falling down onto it while Stiles stands above him and sheds his ridiculous skinny jeans, tripping over his own shoes. It’s hilarious and, somehow, incredibly attractive.

“Laugh it up, fuzzball,” Stiles grumbles, skin blushing in a way that Derek is finally able to just _ogle_ as much as he wants. Who knew demons could even blush?

And then Stiles is throwing his Captain America underwear at Derek’s face, which is also hilarious. Derek uses the elastic band in them to shoot them across the room. They end up dangling from a light fixture. “Three points,” he says with a smile.

Stiles grins fondly as he starts peeling Derek properly out of his jeans and boxer-briefs. “You’re such a goober.”

Derek’s not even going to bother disagreeing. Especially not when Stiles is climbing up on top of him, naked, straddling him and grinding down against his dick.

“And I’m gonna ride you like you’ve never been ridden before, you _goober_ ,” Stiles says, tone going deeper and more breathy.

Yeah, okay, Derek is entirely on board with that plan. He grabs Stiles by the hips, just holding him and moving against him for a moment, before reaching into the nightstand for lube.

Stiles keeps looking at Derek like he’s the most adorable person in the world, which kind of makes Derek wonder if demons don’t usually bother with the gentle stuff when they’re having sex. That’s a kind of terrible thought to have. But _Derek_ , he’s all about the gentle stuff and the making Stiles feel good stuff. So he reaches around Stiles with his slick fingers and teases him for a moment before pressing a finger _in_ , beginning to ease him open. He takes Stiles’s cock in his other hand and just strokes him lightly.

Stiles moans, petting his hands along Derek’s chest as he rides Derek’s finger and fucks into his hand. “You don’t have to worry about hurting me, I promise. I can take it. I can take _all_ of you, every single thing you can dish out. I want to. I want _you_.”

Derek nods. But that doesn’t mean he stops stretching Stiles open, no, it just means he goes a little bit faster. Stiles is whining impatiently by the time Derek is up to three fingers.

“I swear on all things holy and sacred, if you don’t put your dick in me _right now_ , I’m flipping you over and putting my dick in _you_ instead,” Stiles mutters.

Derek moans over the idea of that. “We can do that next.”

Stiles nods and curls his fingers against Derek’s chest, raising little red welts that fade quickly. “Derek. _Derek_.”

Finally, Derek pulls his fingers out. He barely even has his hands on Stiles’s hips before Stiles is grabbing Derek’s dick to steady it and sinking right down on it. It seems like neither of them breathe for a moment.

Then Stiles groans brokenly and starts _moving_ , starts riding Derek. All Derek can do for the first several seconds is hold on, though he manages to start meeting Stiles’s motions with his own thrusts soon enough. It’s slow at first. They’re just enjoying the feel of it, the feel of each other, but then it’s not so much slow as it is _hard_ and desperate and urgent. Derek sits up off the bed and wraps his arms around Stiles, clings to him. Stiles’s hands clutch at his shoulders and his back and his hair. They’re not so much kissing as they are panting into each other’s mouths.

Stiles’s eyes go black all over and Derek knows his own eyes are glowing blue, that his claws are pricking and scratching at Stiles’s skin. But Stiles doesn’t seem to mind that at all. No, it just seems to make Stiles _louder_.

He works a hand between them to carefully, mindful of his claws, jerk Stiles off. When Stiles comes with a shout, his blunt, human nails rake against Derek’s scalp. Derek follows moments after with a low growl.

When his heart slows down and he can think more or less clearly once more, he kisses Stiles slowly, lazily. His fangs are still out and Stiles seems to derive particular pleasure in licking at them.

They collapse onto the bed and just lie together for a while, kissing and touching each other intimately but not demandingly. Then Stiles ushers Derek into the shower and spends a truly ridiculous amount of time rimming Derek before fucking him there, face pressed against the tile wall. Neither of them are even remotely sorry about the tile Derek claws to pieces.

Later, after eating leftovers from the fridge, Derek falls asleep in a bed that smells like them, with his head pillowed against Stiles’s chest.

As last nights go, this is certainly not one he’ll be regretting having squandered. No, this night was perfect…


	12. Propero

Stiles doesn’t stay with Derek for long, though he probably lingers for longer than he should. It’s just that Derek looks so peaceful with his eyes shut and his face relaxed. Dark lashes on pale cheeks; people write poetry about this exact kind of moment. But Stiles doesn’t have time for poetry.

He carefully extracts himself from Derek’s hold, from the bed, and then makes his way to Hell, to the Hall of Records where all the contracts are stored. He’s not sure why he hasn’t looked at Derek’s contract yet. He could’ve been trying to come up with some sort of plan this whole time, instead of rushing to think of something at the last minute. Maybe he thought he could let Derek die or maybe he just didn’t want to think about it at all. But he’s thinking about it now.

And there’s more time in Hell than there is on Earth; maybe he’ll be able to come up with something, _anything_ …

Thankfully, none of the usual background noise of screaming and pleading and suffering from lower levels makes it into this area. This place is for working. Hell is very serious about business matters, especially when it comes to contracts.

Stiles just rushes right past the records keeper and down the impossibly long center aisle. He mutters Derek’s name to himself as he reads the letters on the sides of the shelves and finally finds the ‘Ha’ section, goes down it frantically. The little tags on the ends of the scrolls are impossible to see at a glance, so it takes him a while to figure out which one is Derek’s. He fist pumps when he finds it and rushes right towards the exit of the Hall of Records.

“Mr. Stilinski,” the records keeper says. “You are not allowed to take that from this room without permission from a superior.”

Stiles rolls his eyes over how much like school Hell is sometimes. The records keeper was probably a librarian in her mortal life. “Fine, fine,” he grumbles as he goes over to one of the reading tables. He sits down and reads all the way through Derek’s contract, from the first line to the tiniest fine print at the very bottom of the several foot long scroll.

Six times.

He doesn’t see anything, though. Sure, he hasn’t really been trained in the contract law part of this job, but he’s good at the deal making part and he’d be able to spot any loopholes. There’s nothing. He bangs his head on the table because that’s what this is like; running headfirst into a brick wall of something.

“You’re wasting your time,” Lydia says as she sits on the table next to him. He looks up at her, at her perfectly coiffed red hair and designer clothing. She’s the most beautiful demon who ever lived. She’s also one of the scariest and he’s glad he’s not her enemy.

“I am not. I’m just—I gotta figure out _something_ …”

“What’s so special about him? He can’t be _that_ good in bed,” Lydia says.

Stiles blushes. “It’s not about _that_ , oh my god. And, by the way, he totally is.”

Lydia quirks an unimpressed brow at him. “Then why aren’t you with him, screwing until the end comes?”

“Because I’m trying to make the end, you know, _not_ come. I’m trying to figure out a Hail Mary pass,” Stiles says. He runs a hand through his hair, tugging at it in frustration.

“You’re going to an awful lot of trouble for a human,” Lydia muses. “Especially when he’ll end up in Hell afterwards. I mean, it’s not like you’ll never get to see him again.”

Stiles shakes his head. “Derek is _good_. He doesn’t deserve to be down here. He shouldn’t have to suffer.”

“It isn’t so bad,” Lydia says, looking away across the room. “Once you get past the torture, anyway. I like being a demon. I’m _powerful_. I never felt this powerful when I was an Athenian girl, when everyone was telling me to focus on marrying a man of advanced station and birthing children instead of educating myself. Ten years of all the knowledge I could read about and discover instead of taking over the household of some man who would always believe himself above me, and all the power I have now, completely outweighs a few years of agony. He’ll be fine.”

“No,” Stiles insists. “Derek isn’t like that. He’s not like you or me. He’s not ambitious or power driven; he just wanted to save his sister, his Alpha. He just wanted to protect his family. I honestly don’t know if he’d _ever_ break and become a demon. So I should just let him suffer forever?”

Lydia sighs. “Going to so much trouble for one human… It doesn’t make sense to me.”

“Yeah, well, maybe someday…” Stiles trails off and frowns.

_Human_.

Derek _isn’t_ human, is he? No, he’s a werewolf. He’s a completely different species. And Stiles _knows_ they don’t often have werewolves making deals, so maybe… He scrambles to read through the contract again, skimming and muttering the words aloud.

Not once does it say the word ‘werewolf’. No, the phrasing refers to Derek as any normal human, without taking the special circumstances of his species into account. Which means there’s a little wiggle room in the contract. But that won’t keep the hounds from coming for Derek, will it? No, Hell’s not going to give up anything. They collect; they don’t give back, not for free. The contract is valid _enough_ that it would stand if Stiles contested it.

Maybe he could give Derek a new contract. If it’s more recent and worded correctly, identifying Derek as a werewolf, it would take priority over Derek’s original contract. But he can’t just give Derek more years, no, that would infuriate his superiors. He doesn’t have the leeway to give extensions, even if he _is_ good at his job and rapidly climbing the corporate ladder.

But the clock is running down and Stiles is only _just_ onto something here. He doesn’t have a lot of time to think, to find a solution. Especially not when he keeps thinking of Derek and the hellhounds ripping him apart, just like they ripped Stiles apart. It was horrific. That howling still makes him finch sometimes and he tries to avoid the hellhound pen and their handlers.

Wait. The _hounds_.

He stands up so quickly that his chair goes careening over. “Lydia, you’re a genius!”

“I know,” Lydia says, examining her nails. “What did I do this time?”

“I’ll explain later!” Stiles says as he runs out of the Hall of Records. He doesn’t stop until he gets to the room where the demons who actually write the contracts work, a room that’s full of cubicles. Some parts of Hell look like office space and it’s really, truly depressing. He snags the arm of one of the demons, a geeky looking one named Jared that he’s talked to before. “I need your help.”

He ends up huddling over Jared in his tiny cubicle as Jared writes quickly, telling him everything to include.

“Hurry. Write faster. Hurry, hurry, hurry…”

“I’m _trying_ ,” Jared whines. “Are you sure this will even work? We’ve never done anything like this before. I don’t wanna be being punished if this ends up backfiring.”

“I’ll take all the blame. You tell them I made you. Should cut your torture in at least half probably… But it’ll work. It’ll totally work, I’m sure of it,” Stiles says, even though he’s only going off of faith here. He _hopes_ it works. He hopes his boss, and his bosses boss, don’t flip out. “This is an amazing idea. I don’t understand how no one thought of it before. No, _werewolf_! You have to be absolutely specific in your wording, dude. And hellhound, yes, that’s right.”

Jared puts down his quill pen after a few more minutes of furious writing. “Okay?”

“Okay,” Stiles echoes. He nods frantically. “Be ready to file this _immediately_. You understand?”

“Time is of the essence, yes, I got it. Now _go_.”

Stiles goes. He has to find Derek and, somehow, convince him to agree to a new deal without really having the moments to waste explaining it. He just hopes he isn’t already too late.


	13. Terminus

Derek is pacing along the burned, rotting floorboards of his childhood home. It seems the most fitting place to wait for his death. Though maybe that’s a little horrific, wanting to die where his family did…

He had to make Laura promise to stay away. He knows she wants to be here with him to the very end, but he doesn’t want her to see it, to hear his heart stop beating. He knows how terrible it was looking at her ghostly pale body before he made his deal. He doesn’t want her to have to suffer watching him die; he thinks that would be worse than just seeing his corpse. Still, they fought for a good two hours about it before she relented and agreed to stay away. And then they just held each other for a while. Derek thinks it’s good he’ll have the memory of his sister’s hug to recall fondly when he’s in hell. It’ll be good, will get him through some terrible moments. The memory of his night with Stiles will be a light in the darkness, too, for all that he’s so very, very disappointed over Stiles’s absence now. He gets that maybe Stiles had to go away somewhere. Stiles is busy, has souls to barter for. He can’t _always_ be with Derek.

But he thought, at least, that Stiles would be here with him _now_ , when he’s about to die a brutal death. It would’ve been good to see a familiar face, to know Stiles is here for him. Stiles has been through this himself, after all. It wouldn’t have traumatized Stiles to watch it.

The support would’ve been nice, too, even if Stiles maybe doesn’t feel as strongly about Derek as Derek does about him. It’s kind of silly to think a demon would _love_ him or something. Stiles probably just saw himself in Derek, the boy who gave away his soul for the only family he had left. It was probably pity.

Pity sex…

Well, Derek doesn’t think he’ll be blamed for pretending otherwise, for convincing himself it was real and that Stiles is maybe just being held up by something else. By something more important, some kind of demon business. Maybe Stiles is getting yelled at by his boss for spending so much time with Derek. Maybe Stiles has _died_ or something. It could be that he literally just can’t _get_ to Derek right now. Yeah, that’s what Derek is going to tell himself. It makes him feel better.

He looks at his phone. Maybe it’s terrible to anticipate it so much, but he has a timer running. He wonders if the pain will start as soon as the timer runs out.

He wishes he’d hugged Laura for longer. God, it’s such a silly waste to have gotten here so early. What, does he need to be punctual for his own death? He should’ve stayed with her a few minutes more. He’s never going to see her again. _Ever_ , since she’ll be going to heaven. He’s sorry about that. About how his entire family is in heaven, or will be someday decades ad decades from now when Laura dies, but he’ll be in hell instead. Hopefully they’ll forgive him for this. He did it for the right reasons, after all.

He tilts his head towards the woods outside when he hears the howling start. They’re taunting him. He’s heard werewolves doing this, trying to intimidate their prey. Probably they want him to run because they like the chase. Well, he’s not going to run. He’s not going to let them have that. They don’t sound natural, not like dogs or wolves or anything. They sound like monsters. He bets they’re powerful, unnaturally strong.

They’re coming for him, getting closer. They sound big. There’s no chance he could fight them off, not all of them, and he’s certainly not planning on trying. He’s just going to let them have him. Maybe it’ll be quicker if he doesn’t struggle. Quicker would be better than slower. It’s not that he’s afraid of dying; he’d just rather it doesn’t hurt more than it absolutely has to. He’ll be getting quite enough pain in hell.

“Derek!”

He whips around to find Stiles standing there, looking desperate and panicked. “Derek, do you trust me?”

He honestly doesn’t know. It’s hard to trust someone whose behavior he doesn’t understand, someone he just can't predict. He _wants_ to trust Stiles…

“Please, I _need_ you to trust me,” Stiles says, stepping nearer and pressing his hands to Derek’s chest. “I need you to agree to a new deal right now! We don’t have _time_ , Derek. Do you trust me?”

Derek hesitates for a moment before nodding. “Yes.”

Stiles looks relieved. But the hounds are circling nearer; time is almost up.

“What would you do if I could save you from eternal damnation? If I could keep you from having to die like this, from being trapped in Hell and tortured?” Stiles asks.

Derek hears the wild, slathering monsters, but he can’t see them. The hellhounds are in the room. He can smell their fetid, putrid breath. “Anything,” he says.

Stiles hauls him close and kisses him just as the timer on Derek's phone goes off.

Like they’ve been given some kind of retreat signal, the hounds leave. They leave and Derek is still alive. He wraps his arms around Stiles, holds him close and just keeps kissing him there in the spot he chose to die in. Whatever he just agreed to, everything is okay. Laura isn’t going to have to bury him and Stiles, the demon who claimed his soul, came through for him in the end after all.


	14. Epilogus - et semper postquam feliciter vixerunt

Hell’s not so bad really. Though maybe Derek only thinks that because he got to skip the whole tortured soul part and, also, he does his best to avoid those areas of Hell. He likes his job.

He doesn’t even care if Laura makes fun of him for being ‘Hell’s puppy’.

Honestly, things have turned out better than he could’ve ever hoped. He and Stiles are living together, Laura is starting a pack back in Beacon Hills, and Derek didn’t have to die. In fact, he got quite a few upgrades in the deal. Stiles, being a crossroads demon with a bright future in his career, managed to pull some strings to get Derek a pretty sweet gig: he’s a hellhound. Well, not _technically_. Technically he’s a demon-werewolf hybrid. Which, his fully shifted form is kind of neat and terrifying. They made him an Alpha, too, so he could turn more people into this particular subspecies of werewolf. Upper management seems to like the changes in the program since Derek’s been on the job. There have been far less brutal deaths to draw the attention of hunters for starters, plus the old methods of keeping hellhounds from taking down their prey don’t work on werewolves. It makes the work easier. Until people get wise to what _is_ coming for them nowadays, at least.

He has three Betas at the moment, though they work with the old hellhounds sometimes while the program is still in transition. They’re going to want a few more Alphas so they can have proper teams to send out. It's going to be very well organized and Derek is proud of the work he’s put in making sure everything goes smoothly.

All of Derek’s Betas were referred to him by Stiles, people who wanted to make deals. Stiles saw that they were broken a little, desperate in ways that the people who just want glory or fame or money aren’t. So he asked them to talk to Derek first before they decided to make a deal. And it’s worked out so far. Derek couldn’t be happier about Isaac and Boyd and Erica. They’re good at the job, too, if a little squeamish about the killing part at first.

He understands. He didn’t look forward to it the first few times, either, but then he managed to make himself realize that these people made binding contracts. They know exactly what’s coming for them; Derek and the others, as hellhounds, are just fulfilling the agreement they made with a demon. Derek never brutalizes anyone if he doesn’t have to. He gives them quick, clean deaths. _Good_ deaths. He even sits and talks with the ones who are terrified, encouraging them until they’re finally ready to go. Then he walks with them and kindly guides their souls down to Hell. The ones who run, though, or try to kill him? Those ones he’s far less gentle with. Those are the souls who get dragged kicking and screaming. They should have the courage to go with grace and dignity…

He visits Laura all the time. They’re still family, even if they have their own packs now. Derek thinks Laura’s pack is made up of good people. Stiles even likes them, hangs out with them on game night and gets way too invested in Monopoly. Laura’s new girlfriend, Braeden, is beautiful and terrifying and absolutely perfect for Laura. She’s human, but she carries a gun and isn’t weirded out by demons or demon-werewolf hybrids at all.

But seeing Laura and Braeden together makes him think about himself and Stiles and how he’d like to maybe make that a permanent arrangement. He’s been thinking about asking Stiles to marry him for a few weeks when, after they’ve just had incredibly athletic sex, Stiles flops down beside him on the bed and says, “Hey, you know, you should like agree to tie your soul to mine for forever or something.”

Derek rolls his eyes over how incredibly romantic that is. Still, for some reason, he says yes. Maybe the orgasms are to blame.

Stiles’s demon friend Lydia demands to plan the wedding. Derek doesn’t mind so much, as long as she makes sure a few Hale traditions get included. It’s an endless flurry of color swatches and tasting sessions and clothes fittings. Stiles starts desperately trying to avoid her, which is hilarious until he snares her in a demon trap and she starts lighting things on fire in her anger until he lets her out.

The guest list is complicated. There are demons, angels, werewolves, humans, and also that witch that Stiles made friends with. It turns out they have to have the ceremony in some neutral pocket dimension, just so everyone can attend. Scott happily agrees to help shuttle Laura and her pack to the dimension. Really, it should be fine. And it’ll have the added bonus of there being literally no one outside of the guest list around.

But Scott starts to act a little strange the weeks leading up to the wedding. Derek can see Scott’s wings now. They’re big and brilliant, iridescent white. They’re also _fidgety_ as of late. Stiles asks Scott what’s going on about a hundred times, but Scott refuses to say. It frustrates Stiles a lot. Apparently, Scott has told him absolutely everything since the day they became BFFs. Derek is sure to distract Stiles from his pouting about it with sex. Whatever Scott is up to, Derek doesn’t think it’s a _bad_ thing. He can’t imagine Scott would ever do _anything_ bad.

Finally, the day comes. He and Stiles agree that that whole not seeing each other before the wedding thing is a terrible tradition. Though at least they’re not getting dressed until they’re there, so that’s something. They just head over in casual clothes with Lydia, her date Jackson, and Derek’s pack. Lydia takes right off to go deal with wedding business.

“Holy crap,” Erica says as she turns around on the spot, admiring the view. She’s wearing a retro dress to go with her retro hairdo. She makes a very classy looking wedding guest. Derek almost wouldn't suspect how intimidating she looks with blood dripping down her chin. Of Derek's three Betas, she's definitely the most intimidating. She's wonderful. Though Boyd and Isaac are both wonderful, too, and they look nice in their suits. Derek doesn't play favorites. “Is this pocket dimension, like, completely fictional or something? I didn’t think scenic views like this were real.”

“I guess that depends on your definition of ‘real’,” Stiles muses. “I think we’ll be getting married in that gazebo over there. It’ll make a nice picture with the stream and the forest in the background. Weird how many chairs are set up, though.”

Derek frowns. That _is_ weird. Lydia would never allow extra chairs to be set up, not when she was so intense about getting the guest list exactly right. Derek looks over to the clearing in the woods where the reception is going to take place and, sure enough, there are extra tables there as well.

“Maybe not so weird,” Scott says, appearing behind them. Derek turns to find, not only Laura and her Betas and Braeden, but also Derek’s entire family and some people he doesn’t know.

Derek’s entire _dead family_. He’s completely frozen and convinced that he’s gone insane somehow. Why does he have to lose his mind today, of all days?

“Dad? Mom…?” Stiles says beside him and Derek can smell the saltiness of Stiles’s welling tears.

“Stiles,” says the man Derek doesn’t know. He’s crying, too. It’s the woman who can only be Stiles’s mother who rushes forward and throws her arms around Stiles, though. Stiles’s dad follows.

Derek is distracted from their happy reunion by his own. “Derek,” his mother says, coming forward and cradling his face in her hands. “My sweet boy.”

What follows is a lot of crying and a lot of hugging and a lot of Derek’s family assuring him they don’t hate him for getting them all killed. Though, of course, they insist it wasn’t his fault at _all_ , but Derek’s going to have a hard time accepting that. When things calm down a bit and proper introductions are made, Scott explains that he got special permission from up above to give Derek and Stiles’s deceased family members a day pass, so long as they stayed in this pocket dimension the whole time.

It’s a really, _really_ ridiculously good wedding present.

Lydia asks after a while if they’re going to get married or just stand around all day.

Scott is Stiles’s best man and Laura is Derek’s… best woman? Something like that. One of Derek’s little sisters is the flower girl. When the ceremony is done, it’s another binding contract that Stiles and Derek seal with a kiss.

The reception is amazing. That might be because Derek is happy to be bound to Stiles and because he’s happy that his family got to be here today or it could be because the food Lydia arranged for them to eat is truly the best food Derek has ever eaten. Probably some combination of all that. People Derek loves are dancing and talking and laughing and having a good time; it’s a perfect day.

“Scott’s been making eyes at Lydia’s angel friend, Allison, all night. It’s so cute I wanna gag. Angels in love, _ugh_ ,” Stiles says, sidling up beside Derek with a drink in his hand and a grin on his face.

Derek smiles because, yeah, it is pretty cute. He steals a kiss from Stiles. “Are you jealous? Afraid our honeymoon phase is over now and we won’t be adorable anymore?”

“I’ll have you know that, A, you’ll _always_ be adorable and so will I. I mean, look at this face,” Stiles says, pointing at his own cheek. “ _Adorable_. And B, our honeymoon phase is just _beginning_ , baby. I’m gonna take you to, like, _all_ the best honeymoon locations. I’m even gonna take you to Disney World. Prepare to be honeymooned so well you won’t even know what hit you. I’m gonna dazzle you with romantic getaways and ridiculous gestures of love.”

“You are the weirdest demon I’ve ever met,” Derek says fondly.

Stiles snickers. “If by ‘weirdest’ you mean ‘most awesome’, then I agree. Hey, my mom wants a mother-in-law with son-in-law dance. She says she wants to get to know you, that she’s heard all about you from Talia. Because apparently they’ve been making friends in Heaven? How strange is that?”

Derek doesn’t think it’s strange at all. He thinks it’s perfect, just like Stiles is. And, right now, he wouldn’t change a thing. He doesn’t have a single regret in the world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Too sweet? Maybe but, nope, I don't care. I wanted this story to have a really, _really_ happy ending because I know it dealt with some difficult stuff. I hope you've all enjoyed reading this! I know I've certainly loved writing it. If you _have_ enjoyed it, you know, kudos and comments are nice. Just saying. No pressure...

**Author's Note:**

> hey, come find me on [tumblr](http://thevoiceofwrath.tumblr.com)!


End file.
